Occasionally I share in my church what we call "First Word", which is 2 minutes shared by someone in the congregation. Recently I shared these thoughts on our word of the year, which is repair. The following is what I shared.
Being a visual person when I visited Lan Su Chinese Gardens last month they had an art show on Japanese “Mending”. It hit me as I viewed the show and read the description that it was a form of “Repair”. In a way it reminded me of the hippy form of repairing jeans with patches and visible stitching. I remember doing that when my son was little and he needed holes on his overalls repaired.
This piece of artwork is by Limei Lai, it refers to each piece as “Mending” or repair. Isn’t it beautiful? The technique is also called Sashiko, “Sashiko is a Japanese stitching style that was originally used by working class people as a means to mend used clothing and household items. But it is so much more than that! The even, geometric patterns of sashiko create a beautiful decorative effect, so that they go beyond being purely practical.
In Japan they have a technique called Kintsugi. “Kintsugi — which means “join with gold” — it is the Japanese art of repairing broken objects, often ceramic pottery or glass. Traditionally, gold lacquer is used to piece shards together again, creating a more beautiful object through the acts of breaking and repair.”
A messy garden can heal or repair the earth. It puts nutrients back into the ground.
The complexity of intergenerational communication brings difficulty in understanding. Conflicts cause fragmentations. In ceramic art, there is gold repair to make it functional and beautiful again. In fabric there is the mending stitch that is even and decorative. It is beautiful in its own way. What if relationships or a government could have sweet repair?
If we have the mindset of doing repair as a daily practice, then beauty and joy can be found daily.
There is beauty in embracing the beauty of human flaws, of something that needs repair. Embrace imperfection and turn weaknesses into strengths. Notice the small things, the hearts that need repair and surround them with love, for they too are beautiful.
Hope you enjoyed my thoughts on "repair".
We are all a work in progress and beautiful in our own way.
Sending love,
Marilyn
3 comments:
In case you were curious, the Hebrew verb for 'renew' or 'repair' is חָדַשׁ. It is used most famously in the phrase בְּרִית חֲדָשָׁה from Jeremiah 31:33 (which is also quoted in Hebrews 8:8), which is often translated as 'new covenant' but would more accurately be translated as 'renewed covenant'. The covenant has already been renewed before, of course, most notably after the golden calf incident. What makes this prophecy so interesting is that this renewal will be different than the previous renewals, in that, God's Law, which had only been written on stone and paper, will now be written on our hearts. Quite the promise isn't it? Certainly, those broken tablets could never have been fixed with mere kintsugi. How fortunate then that we have a Messiah to mend that broken covenant?
I have heard of the Japanese art of repairing broken objects. That's really something. You know, I don't like chips, breaks, rips or tears. I usually want to discard the item after. But someone once pointed out that these broken pieces represent the broken pieces of our life, and to keep them. Sometimes if I truly love the item, I will keep it now if it's broken. And I really love your words at the end, Marilyn, about the hearts that need repair. Such a dear and special cluster of words.
~Sheri
What an interesting show. Americans are so consumer oriented -- use it and toss it. So much we don't repair. This is a good lesson.
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